From Islamophobia to Remigration: What Happened in Copenhagen on 5 September 2026?

Bashy Quraishy Secretary General – European Muslim Initiative for Social Cohesion – Strasbourg

Thierry Valle Coordination des Associations et des Particuliers pour la Liberté de Conscience. France

On 5 September 2026, a man in a mask raised his right arm in a Nazi salute on the streets of Copenhagen. The image was quickly contested online. Was it artificial intelligence? Was it manipulated? Was it even real? It was real.

Denmark’s independent fact-checking organisation TjekDet examined video from several angles and established that the man repeatedly made the gesture. The footage was taken during a demonstration organised by the right-wing organisation Det Danske Folk ( The Danis People), whose published messages included “freedom, security and Danish culture,” a “fair remigration policy” and “no to the Islamisation of Denmark.”

The police were there. There was a counter-demonstration organised by anti-racist groups. There were arrests in connection with incidents surrounding the demonstrations. And there was a masked man publicly performing one of the most recognisable gestures of European fascism. Yet the most important story may not be the man himself.

The deeper story is the political environment in which the word “remigration” has become increasingly normalised, while Muslims and Islam have become recurring subjects of political anxiety, cultural conflict and electoral competition.

The question Denmark should now ask is not simply:

Who was the man making the Nazi salute? It is: What has happened to the political language of belonging in Denmark when “Danishness”, immigration, Islam, cultural incompatibility and “remigration” increasingly occupy the same political space?

The demonstration that called itself “Danish”

The organisers of the 5 September march did not officially present themselves as Nazis. Quite the opposite. Their public material invoked Danish freedom, security and culture. At the same time, the organisation advocated a “ remigration policy” and opposition to “Islamisation of Denmark. ”That distinction matters.

A democratic society must be able to debate

When “remigration” appears alongside “no to Islamisation”, the obvious question becomes:

Who exactly is supposed to remigrate? Rejected asylum seekers? People without residence permits? Foreign nationals convicted of crimes? Or, eventually, people who are legally resident but regarded as insufficiently Danish because of their religion, ancestry or culture?

That distinction is not academic. It goes to the heart of democratic citizenship.

The word “remigration” has a relatively neutral meaning if used to describe the return of people who have no legal right to remain in a country. But in contemporary European far-right politics, “remigration” carries a much broader ideological meaning. It shifts the discussion from immigration control to population removal. That is why the term deserves careful scrutiny.

Denmark is trying to lead EU towards a Fortress Europe

Denmark is already pursuing exceptionally restrictive migration policies. In January 2026, the government announced an expulsion reform under which foreign nationals receiving at least one year’s unconditional prison sentence for serious crimes would, as the clear starting point, be expelled. On 4th September — one day before the Copenhagen demonstration — Denmark hosted a meeting of five European countries discussing agreements with third countries to establish “return hubs” for migrants without legal residency. Denmark said it aimed to begin transferring migrants to such facilities by the end of 2027.

These are government policies. They are not extremist policies merely because they are restrictive. But their existence creates an environment in which the word “return” and the word “remigration” can increasingly overlap in public debate.The democratic responsibility is therefore to maintain a clear distinction: Return of a person who has no legal right to remain is one thing. Removal of a citizen or lawful resident because of ethnic, religious or cultural identity is another. The second would fundamentally challenge the principle of equal citizenship.

The Muslim question

There is another uncomfortable reality. In Denmark, immigration policy is increasingly discussed through the prism of Islam. Prime Minster, Mette Frederiksen’s political rhetoric illustrates this broader tendency. In her New Year’s address in January 2026, the Prime Minister said that  those responsible for what she called “mad driving” and “dominance culture” should not be in Denmark and declared that people who come to Denmark and commit crime should leave.

Then in her speech in the Danish Parliament on 12th August 2026, she again raised her accusations against Muslims and repeated : Migrants with ‘Islamic background’ are the greatest threat to Europe. She continued; “So Europe is threatened. The problem is that we are threatened both from outside and now from within. Because of people with an Islamic background who do not want the open, free European society. Unfortunately.”

Her harsh remarks echoed widely in the international media but very little condemnation at home. There is nothing inherently illegitimate about a prime minister speaking forcefully about crime. The problem arises when particular groups repeatedly become associated in public discourse with crime, cultural incompatibility, social control and threats to national identity.

This is where the political climate matters. Words do not remain inside Parliament. They travel. They appear in headlines. They become campaign slogans. They are repeated on social media. And eventually they can be appropriated by movements further to the political right.

PM Frederiksen is not alone in her anti-minority and anti-Islam statements. Morten Messerschmidt, leader of the Danish People’s Party, which is the second largest party today, routinely  characterises Islam as an incompatible political and religious ideology that threatens Danish culture, security, and democracy. There are few other political parties in Danish parliament that openly talk of zero Muslim Immigration, ban on Sharia, removal of Islamic customs and Influence that is coming through Islamic practices. All these anti-Islam parties have sizeable following and voters who use mainstream and social media to spread their party messages.

The far right does not necessarily invent every idea it uses. Sometimes it takes ideas already circulating in respectable political discourse and pushes them to their logical extreme. That is why mainstream politicians have a responsibility not only for what they explicitly say, but also for the political non-boundaries they help to expand.

The Nazi salute was real

For a brief period after the demonstration, the public debate became entangled in a second controversy: whether the image of the Nazi salute was AI-generated. It was not. TjekDet examined material from different angles and established that a man participating in a “remigration” demonstration in Copenhagen really did perform a Nazi salute repeatedly. That fact should neither be exaggerated nor minimised. It should simply be acknowledged.

What did the police do about the masked Nazi-saluting participant?

This matters because Danish law specifically addresses face covering during public assemblies. Under Penal Code §134 b, a person participating in a meeting, assembly or procession in a public place while having their face wholly or partly covered in a way capable of preventing identification can be punished by a fine or imprisonment of up to six months. In other words, face covering at a demonstration is not simply a matter of fashion. It can constitute a criminal offence.

But Denmark does not have a simple law stating that every Nazi gesture automatically results in arrest. The relevant legal framework can include §266 b, Denmark’s hate-speech provision, which criminalises public statements or communications that threaten, insult or degrade groups because of race, skin colour, national or ethnic origin, religion and certain other protected characteristics. Propaganda activity is an aggravating circumstance. The legal nuance should not become an excuse for political indifference. Something can be legally complex and politically unacceptable at the same time. The Danish authorities should explain whether they investigated the incident.

The missing question: why is extremism discussed differently?

This is perhaps the most important issue arising from Copenhagen. Denmark has spent years  discussing radicalisation, Islamist extremism, Islamism and Islamic terrorism, without once publicly explaining as to what Danish state means by these terminologies and why these are used in connection with integration, social control, citizenship, security, immigration, deportation and Danish values. Here the question comes; why should the same seriousness not apply to far-right extremism?

If a Muslim extremist commits a crime, we should not blame Muslims or Islam but we do.

If a far-right extremist commits a crime, we should not blame all Danes and we do not.

The standard should be identical. Judge the ideology. Judge the conduct. Judge the evidence.

Not the ethnicity of the perpetrator. Not the religion of the perpetrator. Not the political convenience of the perpetrator. The double standard must be demonstrated, not merely alleged. There is, however, an important correction to make to the public narrative. It would be wrong to claim that Danish politicians completely ignored the Nazi salute. Some prominent politicians did condemn it. That is important. The question is therefore not: “Why did nobody condemn the Nazi salute?” The more serious question is:

Why does the political treatment of far-right extremism often appear different in framing, intensity and consequences from the treatment of extremism committed by few with Muslim background?

That is a question that deserves empirical investigation.

It should be measured through:

•             parliamentary statements;

•             ministerial speeches;

•             front-page coverage;

•             television debates;

•             police press releases;

•             arrests and prosecutions;

•             political party responses;

•             legislative initiatives;

•             and the frequency with which extremism is connected to an entire religious or ethnic community.

Only such evidence can establish whether a systemic double standard exists. But the question is entirely legitimate. The politics of collective suspicion. There is another danger here.

A society can move from judging individual conduct to judging collective identity.

A Muslim commits a crime. The discussion becomes “Muslim crime.”A radical Muslim makes a statement. The discussion becomes “Islam.” A conservative Muslim family is accused of social control.The discussion becomes “Muslim culture.” A migrant commits a violent offence. The discussion becomes “non-Western values.” Over time, the individual disappears. The category remains. This is dangerous because it turns millions of people into a permanent political problem.

The reality is that most Muslims in Denmark live peacefully, most immigrants are not criminals, most people with non-Western backgrounds do not reject Danish democracy and many Danish Muslims are simply what they say they are: Danish. They may have Pakistani, Turkish, Iraqi, Somali, Bosnian or Arab family backgrounds. They may also be doctors, teachers, entrepreneurs, students, soldiers, civil servants, artists or politicians. Their identities are layered. Yet public debate often reduce them to one layer. Muslim. That is the beginning of collective suspicion.

From criticism of Islam to Islamophobia

A democratic society must protect criticism of religion. That principle should never be abandoned. People must be free to criticise Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism or any other faith. They must be free to criticise secularism, atheism or even democracy. They must be free to criticise religious institutions, their representatives and their practices. The dividing line is between criticism of ideas and degradation of people because of their identity.

That distinction is essential.

Criticising Islamic theology is not automatically Islamophobic. Opposing political Islam is not automatically anti-Muslim. Demanding equality between men and women is not anti-Muslim. Demanding that religious institutions obey Danish law is not anti-Muslim.

But portraying Muslims collectively as dangerous, culturally inferior, inherently criminal or permanently foreign is something else. And when such rhetoric becomes normalised, native Danish extremists interpret it as permission to move from words to exclusion. That is exactly what has happened in Denmark. The roots of hatred of Islam has taken hold and Islamophobia has prospered.

The symbolism of the Danish flag

One cannot defend Danish democracy by importing the political symbols of its enemies.

Nor can Christianity be meaningfully invoked as a symbol of civilisation while tolerating an ideology that historically produced some of Europe’s worst crimes.

If Denmark is to defend its culture, it must decide what that culture actually means.

Does Danishness mean ancestry? Blood? Religion? Language? Or democratic citizenship?

The answer matters. The danger of moving the political centre to far right has consequences as

Europe has learned an uncomfortable historical lesson in such move.

Extremism does not always enter political life through the front door. Sometimes it enters through vocabulary. A concept that initially sounds technical becomes political. A political slogan becomes respectable. A respectable slogan becomes mainstream. The extreme version then becomes easier to articulate. This does not mean every mainstream politician using restrictive immigration language is a far-right politician. That would be intellectually dishonest. But it does mean that democrats should be vigilant about normalisation.

The European far right has increasingly succeeded in making immigration the dominant political question. Recent European commentary has specifically warned about the growing normalisation of “remigration” politics and the pressure placed on mainstream parties to move toward increasingly restrictive migration positions. Denmark is not only the part of this wider European development but in fact is the leading instigator.

The question is whether Denmark will respond by moving further toward the far right — or by reclaiming a democratic middle ground in which immigration can be managed without making minorities permanently suspect.

What should Denmark do now?

The Danish government should clearly define “remigration” and distinguish between lawful return of people without a right to remain and removal of people based on ethnicity, religion, ancestry or cultural identity. There should be no ambiguity.

The government should apply one standard to all extremism and should explicitly state that:

extremism among some Muslims, neo-Nazism, white supremacism and violent political extremism are all unacceptable. No hierarchy. No political convenience. No selective outrage.

Denmark should defend freedom to criticise Islam while simultaneously confronting collective hatred against Muslims. These principles are not contradictory. They are mutually reinforcing.

Denmark needs to establish stronger monitoring of extremist movements.  Authorities should monitor extremist groups based on behaviour and credible evidence rather than ethnicity or religion. The same threshold should apply to extremist among Muslims and far-right organisations.

Last but not the least, it require greater transparency and responsibility from political parties.

When mainstream parties adopt language used by racist and far right extremist movements, they should explain precisely what they mean. If “remigration” means deportation of people without lawful residence, say so. If it means something broader, the public deserves to know.

And what should the media do?

The Danish media has a particularly important responsibility to stop treating every immigration story as an Islam story. Immigration is a legal and political issue. Islam is a religion. Muslims are individuals. These are not interchangeable categories, so stop collective labelling.

A Muslim criminal is a criminal, a Muslim extremist is an extremist. A far-right extremist is a far-right extremist and a Danish criminal is just a criminal , not a Christian criminal.

The media should identify the relevant individual or organisation rather than turning individual wrongdoing into collective suspicion. Journalists should investigate both extremes and apply the same investigative energy to:

• extremist Muslim networks,
• neo-Nazi networks,
• white supremacist networks,
• anti-Muslim organisations,
• violent anarchist groups,
• and other extremist movements.

Democracy is better served when journalism follows evidence rather than political fashion. Media  should investigate political normalisation and should ask not only:

“What did the extremists say?” but also: “Where did this vocabulary come from?” “Who has normalised it?” “How has its meaning changed?” “Who is its target?”

That is investigative journalism.

Copenhagen’s warning

The 5th September, 2026 demonstration does not prove that Denmark has become a Nazi country. There was a big counter demonstration close to the far right gathering. People of all ages and ethnicity came from various towns to raise their concern against increasing racism, Islamophobia and remigration talk. They were however treated harshly by the police that used batons to control them. Police clashed with anti-racism protesters because they were in the way of the far right nationalist march calling for ‘remigration’. Law enforcement has launched an active investigation immediately following the event to identify and prosecute individuals who broke the law.  

But it does reveal something that should not be ignored. A political movement can campaign under the respectable language of Danish culture and security while attracting individuals willing to display Nazi symbolism. A word like “remigration” can move from the margins toward mainstream political debate without everyone agreeing on what it means. A society can become increasingly accustomed to discussing Muslims as a problem without consciously deciding that Muslims are a problem. And extremists can exploit that ambiguity. That is why 5th September deserves more than condemnation of one masked man. It deserves examination.

The democratic test

The true test of Danish democracy is not whether Denmark can defend itself against extremists.

It can. The deeper test is whether Denmark can defend equal citizenship while having difficult conversations about immigration, integration, religion and national identity.

A democratic Denmark should be able to say:

Yes, we will control our borders, deport people who have no legal right to remain where the law permits, will confront serious crime and challenge extremism among some Muslims.

But simultaneously:

No, Muslims are not collectively responsible for the actions of few extremists, immigrants are not a single cultural category, citizens cannot become second-class citizens because of their ancestry or religion,  far-right extremism does not become less dangerous because it is wrapped in the Danish flag and finally: No political movement should be allowed to redefine Danishness as ethnic or religious ownership of Denmark.

Beyond 5th September

The most important question arising from Copenhagen is therefore not whether one man should be prosecuted. That question should certainly be answered according to Danish law. The larger question is what kind of political culture Denmark wants to build.

A culture in which immigration can be debated without demonising immigrants, where Islam can be criticised without treating Muslims as a collective enemy,extremism among some Muslims is confronted without giving far-right extremism a free pass, where “remigration” has a precise legal meaning rather than becoming a euphemism for ethnic or religious exclusion.

And a culture in which the Danish flag belongs to all Danish citizens, not only to those who believe their ancestry gives them greater ownership of the country and use flag to dehumanise other ethnic groups.

The Nazi salute on Copenhagen’s streets was made by one man. But democracies should never ask only who raised the arm. They should also ask: What political climate made the gesture possible?

What language made the demonstration respectable? What ideas are becoming normal?

And most importantly: Where will Denmark draw the line?

Because the defence of democracy does not begin when the extremists have already crossed the line. It begins by deciding, clearly and publicly, where the line is.